The Korn Ferry Tour Championship Presented by United Leasing & Finance donated over $262,000 to regional charities in 2018 through the Golf Gives Back program. This contribution brings the seven year total to more than $1.5 million dollars!

Use the unique YMCA ticket link below to attend the golf tournament for FREE, August 30th-September 2nd at Victoria National.

Every ticket scanned with this special YMCA barcode, earns money for the YMCA of Southwestern Indiana. Scan your free ticket each day of the tournament to earn more money for vital YMCA youth outreach programs!

From your physical body to your emotional state, prenatal yoga is a key ingredient to a healthy, happy pregnancy.

By Holly Lebowitz Rossi

Prenatal yoga sounds like a healthy practice to adopt during pregnancy – and it is. But what specifically can prenatal yoga do to help you feel great and stay calm during the most important nine months of your life? Read on for seven important ways yoga can make a positive difference in your pregnancy.

Supports Your Changing Body

“Our bodies are always changing,” says Jane Austin, a pre- and postnatal yoga teacher based in San Francisco and the founder of prenatal yoga school Mama Tree. But in pregnancy, the body experiences “an accelerated pace of change,” she says, and needs help adjusting and compensating. “Prenatal yoga practice is designed to support the changes that happen in a pregnant body,” Austin says, by offering women healthy, safe ways to stretch their muscles and strengthen their bodies – their lower bodies in particular – to ease the process of supporting a growing belly.

Tones Important Muscle Groups

Prenatal yoga “tones the physical body, especially the pelvic floor, hip, and abdominal core muscles, in preparation for the birthing process,” says Liz Owen, a Boston-based yoga teacher and the co-author of Yoga for a Healthy Lower Back: A Practical Guide to Developing Strength and Relieving Pain. A properly toned muscle has the right balance between length and strength – it is neither too lax nor too tight. Building and maintaining muscle tone during pregnancy, with yoga poses like lunges and gentle backbends, can help minimize the aches and pains of those nine months, and are key in bringing your body back to a toned condition after delivery, Owen says.

Prepares for Labor and Delivery

A top priority in Austin’s prenatal yoga classes is teaching women “they can trust that their bodies will open” up to labor and birth. “When we’re afraid, we tighten up,” she says, and that tightening leads to what she calls a “fear-tension-pain cycle.” This can sabotage a woman’s efforts to remain present and calm in labor, especially if she hopes to experience childbirth with minimal or no pain medication. Working to connect with yogic methods of deep, mindful breathing can help the body loosen and relax, and help women get to a “mammalian place,” Austin says, where they can let their bodies do what they instinctively already know how to do: give birth.

Promotes Connection With Your Baby

Even the act of going to a prenatal yoga class once (or more) each week is a gentle reminder to take the time out of a busy work and home life to care for and bond with your growing baby. As your pregnancy progresses, your body’s different responses to yoga poses will be a reminder of other physical changes happening in your body. Certain poses, such as Hero pose, in which you sit back on your heels and then sit up straight to lengthen your spine, can become meaningful if you breathe deeply while in it.

Provides Relief From Common Pregnancy Complaints

Prenatal yoga may be the cure for what ails you if you’re suffering from common pregnancy discomforts such as lower back pain, nausea, insomnia, headaches, shortness of breath, and carpal tunnel syndrome. By stretching and toning muscles, you can help blood circulate throughout the body in a healthy way. Also, deep breathing can bring much-needed oxygen to your baby and to your own muscles. A 2012 University of Michigan study showed that mindfulness yoga, which combines physical poses with meditation practices, can bring measurable relief to the depression that can accompany the emotional journey of pregnancy. Of course, not all symptoms are guaranteed to disappear altogether, but the multidimensional approach of yoga to both physical and emotional health can help your body take the uncomfortable aspects of pregnancy in stride.

Gives You a Healthier Pregnancy

It’s probably not surprising that research has confirmed a healthy mama is more likely to have a healthy baby. In fact, a 2012 study found that women who regularly practiced yoga during pregnancy were less likely to have preterm labor or to deliver a low-birthweight baby.

Encourages You to Make Friends With Like-Minded Mamas

One of the greatest benefits of prenatal yoga may be joining a community with other expectant moms. The Y offers prenatal yoga on Thursdays at the Dunigan Family YMCA. The class is FREE for Y Members and only $70 for non-members. Sharing the pregnancy journey with new friends can help ease your anxiety about impending motherhood while also easing your back pain and calming your body.

Strength training: OK for kids?

Strength training offers kids many benefits, but there are important caveats to keep in mind. Here’s what you need to know about youth strength training. Done properly, strength training offers many benefits to young athletes. Strength training is even a good idea for kids who simply want to look and feel better. In fact, strength training might put your child on a lifetime path to better health and fitness.

Strength training, not weightlifting

Don’t confuse strength training with weightlifting, bodybuilding or powerlifting. These activities are largely driven by competition, with participants vying to lift heavier weights or build bigger muscles than those of other athletes. This can put too much strain on young muscles, tendons and areas of cartilage that haven’t yet turned to bone (growth plates) — especially when proper technique is sacrificed in favor of lifting larger amounts of weight.

For kids, light resistance and controlled movements are best — with a special emphasis on proper technique and safety. Your child can do many strength training exercises with his or her own body weight or inexpensive resistance tubing. Free weights and machine weights are other options.

For kids, what are the benefits of strength training?

Done properly, strength training can:

Increase your child’s muscle strength and endurance

Help protect your child’s muscles and joints from sports-related injuries

Help improve your child’s performance in nearly any sport, from dancing and figure skating to football and soccer

Develop proper techniques that your child can continue to use as he or she grows older

Keep in mind that strength training isn’t only for athletes. Even if your child isn’t interested in sports, strength training can:

Strengthen your child’s bones

Help promote healthy blood pressure and cholesterol levels

Help your child maintain a healthy weight

Improve your child’s confidence and self-esteem

When can a child begin strength training?

During childhood, kids improve their body awareness, control and balance through active play. As early as age 7 or 8, however, strength training can become a valuable part of an overall fitness plan — as long as the child is mature enough to follow directions and practice proper technique and form.

If your child expresses an interest in strength training, remind him or her that strength training is meant to increase muscle strength and endurance. Bulking up is something else entirely — and most safely done after adolescence, when your child has reached physical and skeletal maturity.

You might also check with your child’s doctor for the OK to begin a strength training program, especially if your child has a known or suspected health problem — such as a heart condition, high blood pressure or a seizure disorder.

What’s the best way to start a strength training program for kids?

A child’s strength training program isn’t necessarily a scaled-down version of what an adult would do. Keep these general principles in mind:

Seek instruction. Start with a coach or personal trainer who has experience with youth strength training. The coach or trainer can create a safe, effective strength training program based on your child’s age, size, skills and sports interests. Or enroll your child in a strength training class designed for kids.

Warm up and cool down. Encourage your child to begin each strength training session with five to 10 minutes of light aerobic activity, such as walking, jogging in place or jumping rope. This warms the muscles and prepares them for more-vigorous activity. Gentle stretching after each session is a good idea, too.

Keep it light. Kids can safely lift adult-size weights, as long as the weight is light enough. In most cases, one or two sets of 12 to 15 repetitions is all it takes. The resistance doesn’t have to come from weights, either. Resistance tubing and body-weight exercises, such as pushups, are other effective options.

Stress proper technique. Rather than focusing on the amount of weight your child lifts, stress proper form and technique during each exercise. Your child can gradually increase the resistance or number of repetitions as he or she gets older.

Supervise. Adult supervision by someone who knows proper strength training technique is an important part of youth strength training. Don’t let your child go it alone.

Rest between workouts. Make sure your child rests at least one full day between exercising each specific muscle group. Two or three strength training sessions a week are plenty.

Keep it fun. Help your child vary the routine to prevent boredom.

Results won’t come overnight. Eventually, however, your child will notice a difference in muscle strength and endurance — which might fuel a fitness habit that lasts a lifetime.

Judy Burden feels healthier now at 78 than she did 20 years ago. Judy has been a member of the YMCA for ten years and for the past three years she has worked with a personal trainer three days a week. In that time Judy has lost 115 pounds. This lifestyle change not only boosted her confidence as her clothes size began to shrink but it has also eliminated her knee pain and provides her with the opportunity to babysit for her great granddaughter. She attributes her ability to lift and care for the 35lb toddler to her exercise regimen at the YMCA.

Judy currently trains with Ryan Howe at the Dunigan Family YMCA. Ryan is an Indiana native and traveled the world through professional wrestling, modeling, and music. He’s been an Ohio Valley Wrestling and International Superstar, 2x World Heavyweight Champion, reality TV personality, former WWE “Tough Enough” and final TNA “Gut Check” contestant. He is a Certified Personal Trainer (ACE) with broad experience in strength, endurance, toning, weight loss, and nutrition. “The biggest reward is using the knowledge I’ve gained through these unique life experiences and hard work to help others. There is no comparable feeling to seeing an individual make progress and achieve the success they deserve in the gym, and life.”

If you would like more information about personal training at Dunigan please contact Renee Smith rsmith@ymcaswin.org

The YMCA of Southwestern Indiana is celebrating YMCA’s Healthy Kids Day®, the Y’s national initiative to improve the health and well-being of kids and families. Healthy Kids Day includes fun active play and educational activities to keep kids moving and learning all summer long. The first 300 kids will receive a backpack with summer activity gear like a t-shirt, water bottle, beach ball, coloring books, and more.

Following a four-month national search, Johnathan D. Pope has been named President and CEO of the YMCA of Southwestern Indiana. His first day will be Monday, May 20th, 2019. Pope succeeds Derrick Stewart, now CEO of the YMCA of Greater Indianapolis.

Pope will lead a seasoned management team as the YMCA of Southwestern Indiana continues to grow and serve its members and communities. This includes taking the lead on the Y’s strategic plan, nurturing a mission-driven culture while expanding programs and services, and leading a great team of associates committed to building healthy spirit, mind and body.

“We were blessed to field a diverse group of candidates, and we are confident that both Johnathan’s commitment to our YMCA mission and his leadership experience with a much larger organization will benefit our members, associates, volunteers and community,” said Sara Miller, Chairman of the YMCA of Southwestern Indiana. “His experience in building collaborative partnerships will provide innovative leadership as we continue to expand our programs and services throughout our Southwestern Indiana footprint.”

“I am honored to have been chosen to lead an organization where the mission resonates with me so deeply,” said Pope. “I am looking forward to working with the members, volunteers and staff of the YMCA of Southwestern Indiana in advancing our mission as we take on critical issues that affect our community.”

Pope previously served as District Executive Director/Chief Crisis Officer of the YMCA of Greater Grand Rapids, Michigan. In this role, he led multiple branches and childcare sites generating in excess of $16 million in revenue. Over the past 14 years, he has served in a variety of leadership roles within both the Greater Grand Rapids YMCA and the YMCA of Saginaw, Michigan. He holds a bachelor’s degree in Communications with a minor in Business Management from Saginaw Valley State University.

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